Review: Porsche 911 Carrera GTS

Review: Porsche 911 Carrera GTS

Graham Scott - Autocar

Published:9:00 amFebruary 7, 2017

Manual gearbox, two-wheel drive – and five stars

This is light – it’s only 10kg more than a Carrera S – and simple. Rear-wheel drive, manual transmission, solid roof and other purities result in this: it’s the fastest GTS, with a power-to-weight ratio better even than a Mercedes-AMG GT.

This coupé is the most powerful rear-wheel driven 911 that Porsche makes. Behind the cabin sits the 3.0-litre flat six with its turbochargers helping to make 444bhp. Down the power stream from the seven-speed gearbox, there is a limited-slip diff, torque vectoring and even the option of rear-wheel steering.

The effect is to achieve perfect balance. Perfect balance between engine and chassis, where the Turbo favours the engine and the Carrera S favours the chassis. Everything is working as hard as everything else and the effect is electrifying.

The chassis gains lowered sports suspension, running on very black 20-inch centre-lock alloys, which themselves carry bigger brakes with Turbo pads. This is matched by the black sports exhaust, along with lots of moody black inside the cabin, from the Alcantara seats to the Alcantara gear lever.

Porsche gets on with improving things all the time. They don’t always make a song and a dance about it, but there are several elements here which just seem better than ever, from the seven-speed transmission to the steering. The effect is simply stunning.

This is a five-star car without question. It’s an amazing vehicle that raises the bar it itself raised so high. You get the sense that Porsche engineers are now simply competing against each other, having out-designed everything else.